IT'S RAINING!!!

Normally this would not be a post but we're 11" in the red here and watering restrictions and all and it's just been so incredibly dry. Even the weeds that make up my yard are brown and dead (for now - weeds always come back). We've been living with the smoke from the S. GA fires moving in every few days and nothing to wash it out of the air. And for the last 10 minutes it has been raining a bit!!! Not nearly enough but I'll take what I can get. Even if it doesn't make up for the huge deficit it will help to wash some of the smoke and smog out of the air.

Today I got slightly on top of the clutter on my front porch. I can't even imagine getting all of this out on the drive for a yardsale only to move it back in if it doesn't sell so this morning I listed a few porch items on craigslist and darned if I haven't already sold the fish tank and pocketed $15 for the effort. Now if only I can get rid of the round butcher block table and chairs . . .

Harvey (Japan friend) is coming in next Sunday so I cleaned the extra bathroom. I keep feeling strange because this is a small house and here I've gone and invited him to stay on the futon sofa with little to no privacy and then I think about Japan and surely he will be comfortable and feel like he's in a huge house. I know I did when I came back. I'm looking into pizza options around Atlanta since that's what he says he craves. In Japan pizza (Dominoes pizza - yes they do have Dominoes there) comes with toppings like octopus, corn and mayonnaise. For the record I must say I never tried it. I plan to find him an excellent meat lovers pizza in a top of the line pizza place. Then maybe a movie since Japan gets stuff about 6-10 months after it opens here and a matinee there can cost up to $23.00 just for the ticket. Must look into drive-ins that might still be open. When I first moved here there was a great drive in and I would get a truckload of friends together with iced tea and munchies and the futon from the futon sofa in the back of the truck and we had the grandest time. Unfortunately the best drive-in in Atlanta closed about 8 years ago - replaced with an over-air-conditioned 24-plex monstrosity. Honestly I'm such a hermit so it's strange to think about him staying here but at the same time so many people in Japan went out of their way to do kind things for me so this is the very least I can do. And from now on I will try to pay it forward.

This will be a busy week.